Fire alert
2007-03-22
They will be meticulously checking and maintaining the equipment at the municipality’s 36 year old station, brushing up on training in the 22m high tower and on their fitness in the gymnasium.
Or it could be the day when being a fireman means the difference between life or death, a home or a pile of rubble and ash.
Those are the times for which Drakenstein’s 55 operational personnel and nine officers chose firefighting as their career. Women were allowed to the service in Paarl in 1996.
Being in the fire brigade will never make you a millionaire, or even rich, but they joined the ranks because they had dreamt about it since childhood.
Now it has become a passion to save and to protect, and that means more than any money in the world.
They undergo five months’ rigorous training, in the heat-resistant suit a novice can wear for 20 minutes only.
“Your body adapts to the hot suit,” smiles veteran Dereck Peceur.
The scene of a fire or an accident is no place for the faint-hearted.
Eagerness tops the list when selecting potential candidates, while a fear of heights means failure to qualify.
The emergency call is received in the control room. The men and women jump into their suits, slide into action. Sixty seconds later they roll out of the huge red doors.
From Paarl it takes 12 minutes to Wellington, 45 minutes to Saron.
And each minute can save a life or thousands of rands of damage.
Fortunately there are satellite stations in Wellington and Mbekweni because with 18 firemen on each shift the service is understaffed, officers say. Saron is soon to get its own fire station.
Drakenstein’s four Land Cruisers carry 600 litres of water each and its seven big water tankers carry up to 4500 litres each.
A trailer is on standby, equipped with mountain rescue apparatus as well as gas-resistant suits for chemical fires.
Helicopters dump loads of up to 3500 litres of water at a time, enough to fill a big portapool.
“But our equipment is lacking,” the officers admit.
Water from hand-held hoses can reach up to 30m and from the top of a skylift 62m. Paarl’s tallest building, the Toringkerk, is 57m (the same as the Language Monument).
All the fire brigade’s hoses clamped together would snake 6km far, not that it could be used that far without intermittent pumps.
Distance however, is not the real problem. It is rather the clustered informal homes that hamper access to fire fighters and their equipment.
“We know that every time we go out to a fire, there is a 50% chance that we might be injured or even die, but that does not deter us.
“We need to remain focused. Lack of concentration is the killer.”
When the fire is doused, the child carried to safety, the crashed petrol tanker secured or the cat freed from a ledge, the adrenaline rush subsides and the men and women sigh with relief.
Another job well done.
But it is not yet time to relax. Vehicles have to be refueled, tankers refilled, hose pipes checked for possible damage. The bell for action can sound any minute.
But if all remains quiet, they can scrub the smell of fire from their faces and their hands. And then, to unwind, the table is set for a game of dominoes.
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